


Make It Up As I Go

by N110011



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Almost drug use, Canon Divergence, Drug Use, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Insomnia, Klaus Hargreeves Deserves Better, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Mania, Number Five | The Boy Needs A Hug, Peanut butter marshmallow sandwich, Reginald Hargreeves' A+ Parenting, Set within season 1, Sibling Bonding, give them a break, no beta we die like men, wholesome content TM
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-06
Updated: 2019-04-06
Packaged: 2020-01-05 18:59:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18372143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/N110011/pseuds/N110011
Summary: The one where Five has insomnia, stuck in calculations for days and Klaus is trying his hardest to be a good brother.Just some soft, good sibling content we all need in this economy.





	Make It Up As I Go

  
It was ten past four at night, when a rustling startled him awake. Shuffling, clattering, echoing from the kitchen into the living room.  
Klaus had been spending nights on the couch. His childhood room had seemed like another crypt to him, given recent circumstances. A recent death.  
After taking a moment to orientate in his surroundings, he rose from the couch and squinted into the dark.  
A small packet of unlabelled pills inside a clear plastic bag was easy to make out, by the dim street lights that broke through the blinds,  
reflecting on the smooth surface of the bag like a little halo in his vision.  
  
“Hallelujah”, he mumbled, still half-asleep. Half to himself and half directed towards Ben, who was crouched on one of the armchairs, looking as restless as ever.  
Their eyes met and an unspoken conversation spun between them for the fraction of a second, that didn’t need any words at this point. Not anymore.  
  
Any further hauntings weren’t on Klaus’ agenda that night. The sole thought to be back in his childhood “home” was enough for him to decide to not stay sober.  
He reached into the small bag and helped himself to two small pills, that he began to crush onto the kitchen table with his fist.  
  
A particular bracelet caught his eye. Printed letters on a white piece of paper, wrapped in plastic. Rehab.  
he chuckled quietly at the thought and how far away yesterday already seemed, then leaned down towards the small table in front of him.  
  
Suddenly, the rustling interrupted him, followed by a voice, so small and hoarse, it was hard to make out against the backdrop of the waking city beyond the walls.  
  
Klaus looked at Ben in disbelief. If any ghost had made it into the mansion, it surely wasn’t that of his father. The apparition of his brother watched motionless as Klaus made his way towards the kitchen, where a familiar - and definitely live - figure was busy ignoring him, in the full motion of picking at a broken platter on the floor.

 

“Late-night snack?”, Klaus joked, to no avail.  
  
Five frowned and began moving the broken pieces into a different arrangement, with a concentrated yet disconnected look on his face.  
  
“Yum.”, Klaus tried again, pushing himself up onto the counter to get a better view of the situation.  
  
It took a few moments longer than Five anticipated, but his trail of thoughts was already broken, and he began piling the pieces into one hand and pushing them into a bucket nearby.  
When getting back up from the ground and patting the dust off of his uniform, Klaus caught a glimpse on the dark circles forming under his brothers’ eyes.  
It had been many years since he had last seen him – and even longer since he had seen him like this. Exactly like this.  
And something in his body made him freeze up.  
  
  
He remembered that look in his eyes, he had seen it before, when he had come across a problem he couldn’t solve.  
One of their fathers’ punishments of which he didn’t quite understand the impact of, back then.  
  
Klaus shuddered, as he saw the scene play out again, in the back of his mind, when they were all thirteen again, and the mausoleum was what he had feared the most, apart from losing one of his siblings, and he had looked for a way out at night, a way to escape, if not physically, then through the means of whatever. It had begun with alcohol, when he would nick this and that from the house nobody would miss or could be blamed on anybody else, in exchange for someone to go to a store to buy him a bottle of vodka.  
  
It was one of those nights, that he had come back home, climbing up the fire ladder and into his brothers’ room, as it was pointless to lock his windows or put bars on it, given Five’s ability. If he wanted to sneak out, he could do it any time, but he rarely did so alone.  
Back then, Klaus was thinking Five was wasting his powers not to. And he let him know on more than one occasion.  
  
He climbed over his brothers’ windowsill to find a dimly lit room, with his brother crouched in the corner over a small whiteboard. The marks of a black pen extending way beyond the white surface, climbing onto furniture, walls and floors in uneven notions, and the same desperate look of forced concentration on his face.  
  
Five had barely registered his brother entering the room, so Klaus decided to make himself known. Though he wasn’t too sure whether he should interrupt his brother or not.  
  
“Uhm… I’m back?”, Klaus whispered, not to alarm anyone else in the house, with a bottle hidden under his coat.  
  
Five either ignored him or was still not taking any notice of the other brother sneaking back in. Though, the closer he looked, Klaus soon realized that Five was struggling, small drops of sweat forming on his forehead, still in his wool uniform.  
  
It was way past midnight. The house quiet, Grace resting on her bench. Their bedtime wasn’t past nine, so something else must have been happening in Klaus’ absence that he hadn’t been aware of.  
  
“Five?”, he reached out slowly, with his palms flat, to nudge his brothers’ shoulder without statrling him or sending him across the room in a defensive jump.  
When he just as much as grazed the surface of Five’s blazer, he shrivelled.  
  
“It’s impossible.”, he hissed behind gritted teeth and jumped up, grabbing the pen from behind him, “I knew he was messing with me, but I had to prove it to him, that in some way I could work around it, and it is an option. There’s always a way. I know I can solve it, but I don’t have enough time.”  
  
Five spoke manically, faster than usual, he was so caught up in it, it was hard for Klaus to tell if he had noticed his presence in the room. Four began to scan the room and found a stack of paper resting on his brother’s bed, filled with formulas and strange equations. At least he assumed they were, as most of them barely contained any numbers whatsoever or even letters that he could recognize.  
  
“Did… dad give this to you?”, Klaus asked, a little louder this time.  
  
This time, he had Five’s attention, who immediately rushed over towards him, pen pointed directly at his chest.  
  
“This is your fault!”, he said, voice and body shaking, “Next time you sneak out, think about the effect this has on the rest of us!”  
  
Half-drunk and half in shock Klaus got up and stumbled away from Five, towards the door. He couldn’t tell if he was angry at him or exhausted in a way he had seen it in his brother’s, but he knew he had to get out to avoid further trouble.  
Just when he was reaching for the door handle, it swung open in a single motion, slamming into the wall next to him with a loud noise that made them both freeze up.  
  
“Number Four, Number Five, enough.”  
  
Reginald Hargreeves, dressed in a suit and jacket had opened the door, his cold eyes piercing through both of them in an instant, quietly separating the two of them, letting Five sit and ponder of a problem he couldn’t solve, waiting to break his pride, while taking Four out to the edge of the city, the dreaded mausoleum for him to spend the rest of the night.  
They next saw each other a few days later, quietly staring into the dinner table, before they were called on a mission again the following morning to stop a robbery.

 

He remembered clearly what Five had said back then, when they were apart from their father for the brief moment of uncertainty and danger outside the mansion;  
   
_You learn to work together when you are facing a common enemy._  
  
Back then Klaus had thought he meant whatever crime they were fighting by enemy, but throughout the years he began to realize, or maybe he had known all along, that by common enemy he had meant their father.  
  
  
A cold shiver ran down Klaus’ spine, when he came back to himself. Ben had followed his trail into the kitchen, leaning against the doorframe.  
  
“Impossible to solve…”, Five mumbled under his breath, as he began laying out another peanut butter marshmallow sandwich on a new plate, hands visibly shaking from exhaustion and worry. With a mind unable to shut down.  
  
“Hey.”, Klaus said, a bit louder, but softer than usual, with some of his thoughts still bound to the moment of the past he had just relived.  
  
Five looked up to Klaus, who was still sitting on the counter, but for the first time since they had come back, he was sure he didn’t just look past him.  
  
“What do you want?”, Five hissed, breaking their eye contact immediately after to fold up his sandwich, “I’m already taking a break.”  
  
“Doesn’t really look like it, does it?”, Klaus coughed into Ben’s direction sarcastically, earning him a frown from his other brother.  
  
“Ouch. I’m really trying to lighten the mood.”, he said to Ben, but it was really meant for Five.  
  
The smaller one scoffed and lifted the second plate off the counter with a shaking hand, when Klaus snapped it from him.  
  
“I’ll take that!”, he declared and slid off the counter, “Let me see what you’re working on!”  
  
For a moment Five contemplates to fight back, but he knew too well what exhaustion does to his body. Even the very appealing idea to just jump out of the room without the sandwich seemed close to impractical that moment. He couldn’t afford passing out in the middle of it. Their lives depended on it, the entire world depended on it.  
  
“Fine.”, he sighed and made his way out of the kitchen towards his room.  
He was trying to hide that he was already losing balance, but Klaus noticed immediately and tried to walk as closely to him as possible, in case he had to catch his brother passing out.  
  
They settled down on the floor, where there was still space on the walls, just a few inches that weren’t covered completely in graphs and calculations. Though his memory was hazy from the years and substances that had burned themselves into his ability to remember details, Klaus was able to recognize some of the symbols from years ago, when Reginald had first tasked Five with the formulas of an impossible problem, as punishment.  
  
His heart sunk deeply into his chest and when he tried clutching his hand to it, he felt something else. Something he was still holding in his hands and a brilliant idea came to his mind.  
  
“Hey…”, Klaus began. And Five thought he was going to ask what and why and the meaning of it all. And had to kick his brain into gears for a defensive remark, but the conversation took a different direction immediately.  
  
“How long have you been up?”, Klaus asked instead.  
  
“Three days or so.”, Five answered quickly, trying to make out the last time he had actually slept and had a clear mind, which only seemed a few hours away, and yet several days had passed him already, “But you don’t understand-“  
  
“No I don’t.”, Klaus interrupted him with a calm voice, “I have no idea about what happened in your future, or... uh, past. But I can’t see you solve anything if you don’t calm down, old man.”  
  
Five exhaled sharply and let his shoulders sink.  
Klaus knew he had his attention. _Finally._  
  
“I know what it’s like to not being able to shut down… Trust me.”, his eyes wandered towards Ben who avoided his gaze, either knowing exactly what he had planned, or because he could relate to their conversation just too well to admit.  
  
“What do you suggest?”, Five asked with a frown.  
  
“Oh, I thought you’d never ask!”, he said, and proceeded to slowly pull the little clear plastic bag from his sleeve. It must have seemed like the slowest, most illegal magic trick ever performed to Five, whose eyes widened in disbelief, “Tranquilizers. Trust me, nothing knocks you out better.”  
  
“You got to be kidding me.”, Five sighed, struggling to get up from the floor, marker in hand, to scout for a clean corner on the walls, mind racing, “Isn’t it bad enough to have one on us addicted _beyond repair_.”  
  
Klaus felt hurt, he had really tried. For a moment he considered sneaking a pill into his brother’s sandwich, just because, but Ben wouldn’t forgive him for that. He had already gone too far suggesting it to a minor, though he wasn’t. Technically his body was, but his mind, his brain, was way over fifty.  
  
Four decided that all he could do to help was hold up the plate for Five to reach, while he had climbed up on the bed, working on another equation in the corner of the ceiling. Dim light reflecting in Delores restless eyes, as she watched over the brothers.  
  
“Finally!”, he exclaimed, to himself, circling around some symbols and moving on to another one further down towards the mattress, which caused him to sit down next to Klaus.  
He quickly made it through the equation, when his hands suddenly stopped moving and his body gave in.  
He fell backwards into the bed, his brother catching him halfway and lowering his body down slowly.  
  
Five had passed out due to exhaustion and quickly fallen asleep.  
Klaus slid off the bed in disbelief and looked at the untouched sandwich in his hands, then back to the plastic bag of tranquilizers, secretly wondering if he had done something he shouldn’t have, but reassuring himself quickly that he did, in fact, not have to drug his brother to fall asleep.  
  
He decided to slide the bag back up his sleeve and leave Five’s sandwich on the nightstand, giving Delores a nod of approval as he snuck out of Fives room quietly. Klaus wasn’t sure how long he would rest by himself, so he decided to sleep in his old room one door over for the rest of the night, leaving their doors open.  
They had never been allowed to do this as kids, though sometimes they did it anyway, especially if they had nightmares or Klaus had been assigned individual training the day before.  
  
They all had reasons to fight together, and sometimes a reason to fight for each another.  
_And the rest_ , Klaus was sure, _they could make up as they go_.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for making it through this short fanfic!  
> I had the idea of Klaus drugging Five for a while, but took it into a different direction in the end, hope you enjoyed! 
> 
> The fic title is the song "Make It Up As I Go" (Mike Shinoda ft. K. Flay).
> 
> Update: Edited! needless to say this wasn't beta read!


End file.
